Fact Check: Old video of mob attacking BJP leaders in Darjeeling falsely linked to 2024 poll campaign

Hyderabad: A video of a mob chasing and attacking a group of men wearing BJP’s saffron scarves is in circulation on social media. The claim accompanying the video suggested that BJP leaders were chased away while campaigning for the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.

An X premium user taking a dig at BJP’s election slogan of ‘Abki bar 400 par’ shared the video and wrote, “But the public is welcoming BJP like this”. (Archive)

NewsMeter found that the video was from Darjeeling, West Bengal, in 2017.

On performing a reverse image search of the video’s keyframe, we found the same visuals in a video report by a verified YouTube channel, NMF News, published on October 6, 2017. The video was titled ‘In Darjeeling, Bengal BJP chief Dilip Ghosh and BJP workers were attacked. (translated from Hindi)’ (Archive)

According to the description, Dilip Ghosh, then BJP’s West Bengal president, and other leaders were allegedly heckled and attacked in Darjeeling by a faction of the Gorkhaland Janmukti Morcha.

We also found the same visuals in a video report by ABP News from October 6, 2017, titled ‘Attack on BJP President Dilip Ghosh in Darjeeling.’ (Archive)

A report by The Indian Express from October 6, 2017, said a party delegation led by Dilip Ghosh, who was then state president of West Bengal was chased and allegedly heckled by supporters of Binay Tamang in Darjeeling. The supporters of Tamag also disrupted a meeting by Ghosh. (Archive)

Hence, we conclude that the video of a mob heckling and attacking BJP leaders in Darjeeling in 2017 is being falsely linked to BJP’s 2024 Lok Sabha election campaigning.